Our Torah Reading this Shabbat features the covenant Yah established between Him and Yisra’el at Sinai.
It is the 62nd Torah Reading of our 3-year Torah Reading Cycle. Our reading is contained in Exodus/Shemot 24:1-18.
This is the next iteration of Yehovah’s centuries-long effort to establish how He, the Holy and Righteous God, may dwell with His human creation. For the first time in human history since the fall in Gan Eden/Garden of Eden, Yah communes with a people whom He has redeemed from the clutches of the fallen ones and world and has set apart and called His own. This miraculous yet historic event formed the next leg in Yah’s promise to fix that seeming irreparable breach that resulted from the fall (Genesis/Beresheit 3:15). And true to Yah’s propensity to accomplish His Will and Plan in the grandest fashion, He selected little ole Yisra’el to be the [human] portal by which He would ultimately restore paradise lost, with the added feature of Him dwelling with His people. Presently, not only dwelling among and with His people but, most auspiciously and mysteriously, dwelling within His chosen ones! Halleluyah!
But for this to happen, humanity would first have to be redeemed. And Yah brilliantly foreshadowed this reality and ultimate accomplishment through His delivering Yisra’el out of Egyptian/Mitsri captivity and bringing them into covenant with Him via the Mosaic Covenant. And central to our Torah Reading this Shabbat is the ratification of the Covenant. And that historic covenant ratification was the re-establishing of human fellowship with the Creator of the Universe. Praise Yah from Whom all blessings flow.
From Noah/Noach (I.e., the Noahic Covenant of Genesis/Beresheit 9:9-17) to the Patriarchal Covenants, and now culminating here with the Mosaic Covenant, we see Yah’s faithfulness painted in the broadest, but also the most detailed of strokes, in His insistence to restore fellowship with His chosen people. Ultimately, to restore fellowship with any human seeking to exist for the rest of eternity in a covenant relationship with the Creator of the Universe. For all these individual, initial covenants foreshadowed and formed the very foundation of the Gospel of the Kingdom and the Renewed Covenant that Yahoshua HaMashiyach would facilitate through His Person and Ministries. Indeed, contrary to denominational conventional wisdom, there is “one continuous red thread” that flows throughout the whole of scripture.
The thing that sets this interim covenant version from the previous ones is that it is here that Yah formerly reveals how one is to establish covenant with Yehovah. The ritual proceedings that our reading outlines provide the world with an understanding of how Yah chose to restore that lost fellowship.
How so?
Well, the first aspect of the process involves cleansing or purification. Not so much the cleansing of dirt and filth from the body of the would-be covenant keeper, but a cleansing of the filth of sin from the would-be covenant keeper. And the only way for this cleansing to be accomplished is through the shedding of blood which leads to the death of an innocent sacrifice on behalf of the would-be covenant keeper. In the case of our reading, oxen were slaughtered, their blood collected, and sprinkled upon both the sacrificial altar and the congregation of Yisra’el. This vicarious act transferred the penalty sin would produce in unredeemed humankind onto the innocent, slaughtered creature. This is “atonement”. And the vehicle driving that atonement is blood. Yah described blood as having life within it (Leviticus/Vayiqra 17:11-14; Deuteronomy/Devarim 12:23).
When it comes to atonement, it has become common for us to focus on the sacrifice itself: The slaughtering of the sacrificial creature, which is then burned upon the sacrificial altar. But the so-called Old Testament sacrifices were meant to provide atonement for the offerer, albeit until the offerer sinned again. Then another round of atoning sacrifices had to be offered. Nevertheless, it was the shed blood of that innocent sacrificed creature that brought about the offerer’s atonement and made fellowship with his/her creator once again possible.
Of the shedding of innocent blood for atonement purposes, the writer of Hebrews penned:
And according to the law, I may almost say, all things are cleansed with blood, and apart from shedding of blood, there is no remission (9:22; ASV).
Did you catch that? The shedding of innocent blood is the only thing sanctioned by the Almighty to cleanse and bring about the atonement of sinful humanity.
And it should not be difficult to see that this Torah Reading and the revelation of Yah’s process for restoring fellowship is beautifully foreshadowed in the sacrificial ministry of our Master and Savior Yahoshua HaMashiyach. Yeshua was innocent. He was without sin. And thus, He was the only option to permanently redeem fallen humanity and restore its fellowship with Yehovah.
Again, it was the writer of the Book/Cepher of Hebrews who penned the following as it relates to what we’re talking about here:
So, Christ (I.e., Messiah/Mashiyach) also, having been once offered to bear the sins of many…(9:28; ASV).
Secondly, there must be a mediator to facilitate this cleansing. In the case of our Torah Reading example, Moses/Mosheh was the essential mediator between Yisra’el and Yehovah. Mosheh was the mediator of the covenant between Yah and Yisra’el. Thus, the title given by Bible scholars of this is the Mosaic Covenant.
Most important to be drawn from this story, however, is the reality that Mosheh effectively foreshadowed (I.e., Mosheh was a precursor to) Yahoshua Messiah. And it was the writer of the Book/Cepher of Hebrews who described our Master as “the mediator of a better covenant which was established upon better promises” (8:6; 12:24; KJV).
Thirdly, we also see brilliantly displayed here in our reading that Yehovah brought His would-be covenant keepers (I.e., the nation of Yisra’el) to Himself. Yah not only redeemed Yisra’el out of Egyptian bondage (I.e., a foreshadowing of Yah redeeming us from the clutches of this world), He brought Yisra’el to Himself and lifted them (metaphorically speaking) unto Himself. Through the auspices of this ratified covenant, Yah elevated Yisra’el to a place of sonship and fellowship, and communion. Praise Yah.
Yes, only Mosheh was permitted to ascend to the top of Yah’s holy mountain (I.e., Yah’s established Kingdom here on earth at this point and time in human history) and personally commune with Him. And yes, only the elders and nobles and Aharon and sons, and Mosheh and Joshua were privileged to share the covenant ratification meal with Yah on the mountain (24:9-11). But what these key events foreshadowed was the eventual reality that we who are of and in Messiah Yeshua, will ourselves soon sup with the Creator of the Universe (Revelation 19:9). We ourselves, will forever dwell with Yah and His Mashiyach (Revelation 21:3). And we will be awarded sonship unto the Creator of the Universe (Galatians 4:6). Gone will be the segregated classes of humanity. All who have and will be of Messiah will be co-inheritors with Messiah and sons and daughters of the Most High. And we have that red string of covenants that Yah established with His chosen people throughout history to thank. And most of all, we have the atoning sacrifice and intercessory/mediatorship of Yahoshua Messiah to thank for our covenant relationship with the Creator of the Universe.
And fourth, we must consent to enact/keep the terms of the covenant that Yah has established with us through the Person and Ministries of Yeshua Messiah. We saw this also brilliantly portrayed in verse 24:3. It is documented here in this verse that upon having the terms of the covenant (I.e., the marriage agreement; the ketubah) read to them, “all the people answered with one voice and said, ‘All the words (I.e., hadevarim) that Yehovah has spoken (I.e., as contained in the read covenant) we will do”.
Our understanding of the realities of this foreshadowing separates us from our denominationalist cousins. Our denominationalist cousins accept only the cleansing and mediatorial aspects of the redemption-covenant paradigm. These reject any notion of obedience to the terms of Yah’s covenant. And where there is no regard for the terms of the covenant agreement by any one of the involved parties (this applies to any covenant agreement), well, that covenant will collapse upon itself. Yah will not fellowship with those who transgress His Torah—His instructions in righteousness. Thus, there is no true covenant relationship.
But the denominationalists contend that it is impossible to obey the terms of the covenant, just as was seen through the example of Ancient Yisra’el. Well, in great part, that is true. As we saw through the example of our ancient Hebrew cousins, it was their uncircumcised hearts (I.e., their stiff-necked ways) that inhibited them from obeying Yah’s Torah. And Yah was not ignorant of this fact. His recognizing this critical difficulty led in great part to His giving the gift of the Holy Spirit that gives us (as Torah teacher Gary Stevens of Triumph and Truth often says) provides Yah’s would be chosen ones the “want to” and “will do” heart. That is, Yah’s Spirit chips away at the stoniness of the human heart and exposes a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 36:26). That heart of flesh then is pliable. It is lovingly willing and capable of walking in Torah perfectly, as Yah originally intended.
So, no, the denominationalists are absolutely wrong. Yah has provided us the wherewithal to walk in His Torah and Way of Life. And thus, we can enter and live in covenant with the Almighty without any concern that we will fall.
So, how does the Mosaic Covenant, as depicted in our Torah Reading, apply to us today?
You know, I’m reminded of a thing circulating in and around our Faith communities a few years ago. And that thing, or controversy, if you will, had to do with the applicability of the Book of the Covenant to the modern Messianic Community. And certain perpetrators of this controversy insisted that the Book of the Covenant did not apply to modern-day Messianics. The Book of the Covenant, which entailed all of the content from Exodus 19:1 to 23:33, applied exclusively to Yisra’el. And that it was the Book of the Law (I.e., Book of Torah) that Law (Deuteronomy 31:26) (that being, the rest of Torah) that applied to us today.
Well, I did a post regarding this controversy that if you are so led to listen to or read, I would invite you to do so. But in that post, as I will do here today, I stand firm on the applicability and efficacy of the whole of scripture to the life of Yah’s chosen ones. Everything that Yah has provided us in terms of His laws and ordinances and statutes and so forth applies to us even today. There is no delineation between the two other than the specific terminology used by Mosheh to discern between the terms of the marriage contract (I.e., the ketubah), which he entitled the Book of the Covenant, and the Book of the Law, which was added to the Book of the Covenant to bring the Body to her fullness. Bring them to a place where they may maintain a true and substantive covenant relationship with the Creator of the Universe.
So, yes, the Book of the Covenant in our Torah Reading this Shabbat certainly applies to us today. However, I will postulate that we, as disciples of Messiah, must at some point pull ourselves away from the base of Mount Sinai.
What do I mean by this? Well, many of us in our Faith community find ourselves caught up in the minutiae of the Exodus story and the potential “rote” nature of the Torah. What I mean by the “rote nature of Torah” is the raw specifics of each commandment from the perspective of the ancient Jewish scribes (I.e., from orthodox Judaism).
As disciples of Yeshua Messiah, we’ve been called to walk out Yah’s Torah in Spirit and in truth. This means we must walk out Yah’s instructions in righteousness—the whole of Yah’s Torah—from a Yeshua-centric perspective. Yeshua, the walking-talking Torah, came to demonstrate and teach us how to walk in Yah’s Torah. His example and teachings elevated the “rote” (I.e., raw, baseline) nature of Torah to its greatest potential. To take and show us Torah from the perspective of His Father’s heart and mind (Matthew 5:17).
So, let us take the learning lessons of our Torah Reading for this Shabbat, meditate on them and see how they apply to our respective walks in Messiah. Let us recognize, embrace, and thank Yah for the atoning sacrifice and ongoing mediation of our Master Yeshua Messiah. Let us walk steadfastly in Yah’s Torah—His instructions in righteousness. Let us commune and fellowship with our Elohiym. Praying without ceasing. Offering unto sacrifices of praise by way of the fruit of our lips (Hebrews 13:15). Let us celebrate at every turn the amazing things that Yah has done for us, is doing for us, and will do for us. And let us offer up to Yah our hearts so that His Ruach HaKodesh may circumcise it. Let us love Yah with our whole being and our neighbor as we love ourselves. Let us make our Master proud of us.
Shabbat Shalom. Shavu’atov. May you be most blessed, fellow saints, in training.